British musician (born 1948) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Yusuf Islam (born 21 July 1948) is an English singer. He sang many of his early songs when he called himself Cat Stevens. He was born as Stephen-Demetre Georgiou to a Swedish mother and Greek Cypriot father. He became a Muslim in 1977.[4][5] After two years, he took the name of Yusuf İslam. He has sold over 60 million albums around the world since the late 1960s as Cat Stevens or Yusuf İslam.
Cat Stevens / Yusuf Islam | |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Stephen-Demetre Georgiou |
| Also known as | Steve Adams; Yusuf, Islam |
| Born | 21 July 1948 Marylebone, London, England, United Kingdom |
| Genres | Folk rock, psychodelic rock,[1] soft rock,[1] pop rock,[1] synthpop,[2] electro,[3] nasheed, hamd, spoken word |
| Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter |
| Instruments | guitar, electronic bass (double bass), mandolin, organ, piano, mellotron, percussions, synthesizer; vocal |
| Years active | from year 1966 to year 1980 (as Cat Stevens) from year 1995 until present (as Yusuf Islam) |
| Labels | Deram, Island, A&M, Jamal, Ya |
| Website | www |
As a waiter in his father’s cafe, he began writing songs "to escape the mundanity of it all". Chart success was followed by adulation, touring, drug use, confusion, tuberculosis and, in the early 1970s, Islam's changed outlook and an album called Tea For The Tillerman.
Stevens nearly drowned in an accident in Malibu in 1975. Stevens described the event in a VH1 interview some years later: "I suddenly held myself and I said, 'Oh God! If you save me, I'll work for you.'" He had looked into Buddhism; Zen and I Ching, numerology, tarot cards and astrology", but when his brother David gave him a copy of the Qur’an, Stevens began to convert to Islam.
In year 1977 he changed his name to Yusuf Islam upon becoming a Muslim. He stopped playing and recording pop music for almost 30 years, but started performing again in 2006.
As Cat Stevens:
As Yusuf Islam:
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